lieutenantess

English

Etymology

From lieutenant +‎ -ess.

Noun

lieutenantess (plural lieutenantesses)

1. (dated) A female lieutenant.
   • 1654, “Manner of writing used by the Arragonian Kings of Naples writing to divers Princes”, in Parthenopoeia, or the History of the Most Noble and Renowned Kingdom of Naples, with the Dominions Therunto Annexed, and the Lives of All Their Kings, London: […] Humphrey Moseley, page 181:

     To the Queen of Arragon. To the most illuſtrious Queen, our moſt dear and moſt beloved Wife, and Lieutenanteſs generall.

   • 1861 May 18, Council Bluffs Nonpareil‎^[1], volume V, number 4 (whole 212), Council Bluffs, Iowa:

     But what shall be our uniform? As I hope to be at least a Lieutenant-ess in the new Female Battalion, I should like to be getting the materials together.

   • 1863, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, “Army Life and Camp Drill”, in Mary Thacher Higginson, editor, Letters and Journals of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, 1846-1906, Boston, Mass., New York, N.Y.: Houghton Mifflin Company; Cambridge: The Riverside Press, published 1921, page 185:

     Here I never see a white woman, save two Irish lieutenantesses.

   • 1878 October 3, Monongahela Valley Republican‎^[2], volume XXVIII, number 14, Monongahela, Pa.:

     Capt. S. B. Bentley and a select quartet then sang “Beans for Dinner,” the band played “Bully for You,” and the march was at once taken up for McGregor’s Hall, where Mrs. Gregg and her lieutenantesses had spread the board for about as well prepared meal as ever we struck.

   • 1879 October 3, The Leavenworth Times‎^[3], number 7,226, Leavenworth, Kan.:

     Let it not be imagined that I am high and mighty enough to associate on terms of an equality with lordly Lieutenants and lordlier Lieutenantesses. No! […] I approached an open window to feast my ears with the music and my eyes with the beauty of the aforesaid Lieutenantesses.

   • 1880 March 25, Knoxville Daily Chronicle‎^[4], volume X, Knoxville, Tenn.:

     Imagine Sam. going down Broadway some afternoon with a captainess in front of him, a lieutenantess on either side of him, and a sergeantess in the rear!

   • 1897 April 20, The Chicago Daily Tribune, volume LVI, number 110, page 6:

     But instead, the soldiery will fatten and grow sleek and strong and Commissary Sergeantess Morgan will be promoted and become a Lieutenantess, and then a Captainess, and afterwards a Majoress, and from that to Coloneless, and who knows but some time when she inspects the camp the voice of the sentry at post No. 1 will be heard calling as she approaches: “The Generaless of the Colorado Militia! Turn out the guard!”

   • 1897 November 30, Democrat and Chronicle, volume 65, number 334, Rochester, N.Y., page 8:

     From this hour until Christmas eve “Burke’s” will be emphatically a Christmas Store. We have turned the entire establishment over to Santa Claus—and to you, his legions of lieutenants and lieutenantesses —to the gift-gatherers and gift-givers of Rochester and surrounding towns.

   • 1900, The Masterpieces of George Sand: Les beaux messieurs de Bois-Doré, page 141:

     And she appeared before the lieutenantess and respectfully requested to know her wishes, taking care not to seem to recognize her, or else to humble herself before her as a personage of vastly greater consequence than the servant who used to take the marquis’s little dogs out to walk.

   • 1903, William R[obert] A[nthony] Wilson, “Devoted to Cupid and His Archery Practice”, in A Rose of Normandy, Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown, and Company, page 191:

     I will leave you, M. le Capitaine Tonti, to the tender mercies of my fair lieutenantess, who will show you the bewildering novelty of the marriage market this morning.

   • 1904 April 12, “When Women War”, in The Sun, volume CXXXIV, number 148, Baltimore, Md., page 9:

     The Amazon generaless turned to her first lieutenantess. “The enemy must be hemmed in before the break of the day,” she said, “or we will have to fight.” “Very well, ma’am,” replied the lieutenantess, “I’ll order the volunteer company of seamstresses to get busy at once.”

   • 1906 February 17, The Daily Telegraph, number 15,851, London, page 9:

     Probably nowhere in Europe, not even in Germany, can one so often hear such snatches of conversation as this between two women whose husbands, living most sparingly, cannot make both ends meet: “How is the health of the first lieutenantess to-day?” “Thanks, I am quite well; and how is the magistratess feeling?”

   • 1907 November 1, The Times-Democrat, volume 45, number 18,094, New Orleans, La., page 6:

     No proclamation could give more pain than this, if such a thing as pain existed, for, unless widespread and persistent rumor be not entirely false, more than one of Mrs. Eddy’s most prominent—and, therefore, least loved—lieutenantesses have been enduring their present state of subordination with much impatience, and have long been making subtle preparations for seizing her sceptre the moment it falls from her hand.

   • 1908 May 1, The Manchester Courier, number 16,063, page 7:

     Not having yet located Mrs. Pankhurst, I interviewed one of her lieutenanteses to-day, and put the question as to Mr. Churchill’s probable chances.

   • 1911 October, Louis V. De Foe, “On with the Play”, in The Red Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: The Red Book Corporation, page 1150:

     Holbrook is in executive charge and has installed Maggie as his lieutenantess in an office adjoining his own.

   • 1920 June 14, Brooklyn Daily Eagle, volume 80, number 165, New York, N.Y., page 1:

     A Lieutenantess of Police. Washington now has a woman lieutenant of police.

   • 1949 February 18, “Lions Minstrel Is All Set for Monday Night: ‘Sellout’ Assured With only Few of Tickets Unclaimed”, in Washington C. H. Record-Herald, volume 69, number 12, Washington Court House, Ohio, page 2:

     Mrs. Marian Gage, has been acting as his first lieutenantess with piano accompaniments.

   • 1981 October 5, Michael White, “Raw troops move softly into power battle”, in The Guardian, London, Manchester, page 32:

     Up on the platform, among their lieutenants — and only one lieutenantess — sat the Gang of Four united in a simple, common aim: to be Prime Minister.

   • 1994, An Anthology of Russian Women’s Writing, 1777-1992, page 183:

     You see, it happened that two lieutenantesses were fighting, because their husbands had made cuckolds of them ...

   • 1994, Louisiana History, page 78:

     When the guests saw the lighting in the garden, they all cried: “Long live Françoise! Long live the Lieutenantess Governoress!” Françoise, with her nostrils distended, and Longstreet, with his Metropolitan’s helmet in his hand, returned to salute the worshipful crowd.

   • 2010, Mitch Miller, Johnny Rodger, Owen Dudley Edwards, “The Enchanted Nat”, in Tartan Pimps: Gordon Brown, Margaret Thatcher, and the New Scotland, Argyll Publishing, →ISBN, page 121:

     Brown was PM, his lieutenantess Wendy Alexander was leader of Labour in Holyrood, and the question was whether Scotland should have a referendum on independence.